Tim Cain has taught children and adults from 5-19. From 1977-91 he taught music in three Secondary schools and was Head of Music in two of them, before moving to La Sainte Union College, where he lectured in teacher education. From 1997-2001 he enjoyed a peripatetic career, lecturing in universities on Mondays to Wednesdays, and teaching music in a Secondary school on Thursdays and Fridays. He then became the course leader for the KS2/3 PGCE music course at Bath Spa University and in 2003 he was appointed to lead the PGCE music course in Secondary music at the University of Southampton

He completed a PhD, with Helen Simons, in Initial Teacher Education mentoring. His work in this field has been presented to conferences in Italy, Holland, Spain, Croatia and Slovenia, and he was a member of the Comenius project, Mentoring in Teacher Education, which was funded by the European Union.

Tim subsequently became involved in educational action research (i.e. research by practitioners) and particularly on practitioner research in music education. He has led a one-year project for educational advisers at the Education and Teacher Training Agency of Croatia (ETTA) and also leads the Southampton Music Action Research Project (www.practitionerresearchinmusiceducation.org). He believes strongly in the potential of practitioner research, not only to change practice, but also to generate useful research findings.

In addition to publishing in academic journals, he has published teaching materials for Cambridge University Press, Music Teacher magazine and the magazine of the National Association for Music Educators. He was Educational Consultant for Backtracks and Pitch Fever - two series of educational music programmes for Channel 4. For several years he edited Music in the Curriculum; a termly magazine for Primary teachers. He is happily married with two children and enjoys singing, composing music, walking and various church activities in his spare time.

SOE Research Membership

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• Books
• Fischer, Dietland, van Andel, Lydia, Cain, Tim, Zarkovic-Adlesic, Birgita and van Lakerveld, Jaap (2008) Improving school-based mentoring: a handbook for mentor-trainers, Munster, Germany, Waxmann, 152pp.
• Book Chapters
• Cain, T. (2008) What is the relationship between research and development as a professional? In, Sewell, Keira (ed.) Doing Your PGCE at M-Level: A Guide for Students. London, UK, Sage Publications, 55-71.
• Cain, T. (2007) The National Curriculum for Music. In, C. Philpott and G. Spruce (eds.) Learning to Teach Music in the Secondary School: a Companion to School Experience (2nd edition). Abingdon, UK, Routledge, 42-54.
• Cain, T. & Fletcher, M. (2006) Researching trainee teachers' learning: a musical experiment. In, C. Peklaj, (ed.) Teorija in praksa v izobrazevanju uciteljev (Theory and practice in teacher education). Ljubljana, Slovenia, Univerza v Ljuljani, 91-94.
• Cain, T. (2002) ‘Continuity and progression in music education’ in C. Philpott, and C. Plummeridge, Issues in music teaching, London: Routledge/Falmer
• Journal Articles
• Sewell, Keira, Cain, Tim, Woodgate-Jones, Alex and Srokosz, Anne (2009) Bullying and the postgraduate trainee teacher: a comparative study. Journal of Education for Teaching, 35, (1), 3-18. (doi:10.1080/02607470802587087)

• Cain, Tim (2009) Mentoring trainee teachers: how can mentors use research? Mentoring & Tutoring: Partnership in Learning, 17, (1), 53-66. (doi:10.1080/13611260802233498)
• Cain, Tim and Domaille, Kate (2008) What sort of knowledge is generated by action research? International Journal of Research & Method in Education, 31, (1), 89-94. (doi:10.1080/17437270801905932)
• Cain, Tim (2008) The characteristics of action research in music education. British Journal of Music Education, 25, (3), 283-313. (doi:10.1017/S0265051708008115)
• Cain, T. (2007) Mentoring trainee music teachers: beyond apprenticeship or reflection. British Journal of Music Education, 24, (3), 281-294.
• Cain, T., Holmes, M., Larrett, A. & Mattock, J. (2007) Literature-informed, one-turn action research: three cases and a commentary, British Educational Research Journal, 33, (1), 91-106
• Cain, T. (2005) What I learned from Alan: a case of change in an initial teacher training course. Music Education Research, 7 (1), 119-124.
  Also published as,
  Cain, T. (2005) Lo que aprendí de Alan: Un caso de cambio en la formación inicial del profesorado. Revista Electrónica Complutense de Investigación en Educación Musical, 2, (4), 1-5
• Cain, T. (2004) Theory, technology and the music curriculum. British Journal of Music Education, 21(2), 215-221
• Selection of International Conference Papers
• Cain, T. (2008) How do Secondary school music teachers undertake action research? In, International Society for Music Education World Conference., Bologna, Italy, 21-25 Jul 2008. .
• Sewell, K., Cain, T. and Woodgate-Jones, A. (2007) Bullying on PGCE courses: how can a university protect trainees? In, British Educational Research Association (BERA) Annual Conference, London, UK, 5-8 Sep 2007
• Cain, Tim (2003) ‘Use the overhead projector, the blackboard, the piano much more’: how music graduates learn to teach. In, The Third International Research in Music Education Conference (RIME), Exeter, UK, 08-12 Apr 2003. , 4pp.
• Other
• Cain, Tim (2008) Music education research: more to the point? NAME Magazine, 24, 2-4.
• Cain, Tim (2007) Music education research: what's the point? NAME Magazine, 21, 21-23.